Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1887-11-13

the Indian. The gardens of In
dia and Ceylon now send to Great Britain, as
we see, So pounds out of every 100 pounds
employed among us, having increased their
supply more than two fold in ten years.
And when we consider what 1s0, DOC, 900
pounds signify in the breadth of land occu-
pied by the tea plants, the number of
hands employed in picking, drying, rolling,
sorting, packing and exporting the i'm
mense harvest; that 40 shillings' worth Of
the best tay,' hazarded as a speculative
consignment by the old company, wears an
aspect more wonderful than the scriptural
grain of mustard seed"
Philologists, too, might fiud much to
discourse upon in the way in which the
s'cup that cheers has had its name
changed. In China, its original home, it
is "tcha;" in India, its adopted home, it is
also "chay," and such was its original pro-
nunciation with Englishmen, a is plain
from the couplet, Here thou great Anna,
whom three realms obey, Dost sometimes
counsel take, and sometimes tea" Per-
haps it was the French "the," OF the
Spanish 'tte," which altered the original
appellation.
An Indian ~tea-garden is at the proper
season a very beautiful sight, especially
when cultivation has been clean and care
full. They are spreading, and they will
greatly spread; but, if tea and coffee
should never be wholly dethroned from
their dietetic pride of place, it is quite pos
sible that new beverages may be invented
to rival them. Mate, which the Peruvian
sucks hot through a silver pipe; guarana,
much richer than the Mocha berry or the
Chinese leaf in thine; the kola-nut and the
coca plant are all possible competitors. Inc
negro of the Soudan, Mauritius, West Indies
and Brazil would not give ur the kola-nut
for the best of tea or coffee. Then there
are millions of people who drink infuslons
of the leaves of saxifrage, of ledum, OF pl-
mento and partridge berry, aud hundreds
of unsuspected plants contain the lngredi-
ents which the human race seeks for Ill
sucb beverages. The chiefof these are the
alkaloid which is present by a proportion
of about three per cent. in ordinary tea,
and the aromatic oil which gives to that
and to coffee their special flavor.
The Chinese will not drink new tea be-
cause it contains too much Of the latter
ingredient and is sometimes actually in
toxicating. The "theine" diminishes the
waste of the body, enabling it to get along
with less nourishmeut, 50 that it saves
food and is in~stinctively valued for this by
the poor. The Tartars obtain still more
s~ustenance from their brick tea by powder
ing it and boiling with salt and mutton fat,
whereby the caseine or gluten OF the plant
becomes extracted. Then they can live for
weeks on the tea leaves, which the British
housewife throws away. On the other
hand it is distinctly bad to let tea stand
too long; that brings out ~tannin, and too
much tannin will turn meat taken at the
same time into a sort of leather within the
stomach. There can he little need, how
ever, to instruct the matron of these
islands in the art of te%a-making. From
the silver guilt equipage of the Duchess to
the brown stone pot in which the washer
woman solemnly prepares her evening dish
of tea. the art of making it is essentially
feminine, and has been profoundly studied.
One hundred and eighty million pounds
per aunum all passed through teapots-
what a river to spring from Pepys' first
tentative spoonful and the modest invest
ment of the old East India Company?